Construction Of Heritage Research Articles

A Technical Tool for Urban Upgrading: An Application for Cultural Heritage Preservation and Planning for Affordable Housing

A technical tool to support projects for urban reforms and the implementation of current land policies is presented together with an example for its application in a project concerning the preservation of privately-owned residential buildings listed as “protected” cultural heritage (CH) constructions, urban planning and planning for affordable housing provision. The projects should be based on the voluntary participation of current property owners and an agreement signed between them and the private developer (team of professionals), so that the project will be self-financed through value capture measures to be decided by the state. The application presented here is based on the assumption that the state, by example, has set the rules for an increase in FAR in order to apply affordable housing policy and the preservation of listed CH residential private constructions. The state also provides the rules for identifying the target group of beneficiaries for affordable housing. Current property owners contribute the land, while the developer’s team undertakes all project costs. New property units are shared accordingly with the developer, the current owners and the beneficiaries for affordable housing. No additional public funds for the “affordable housing” units or for expropriation of the protected CH buildings is required.

Formation of the Valmiki Heritage: Making Sense of Dalit Cultural Assertion in Punjab

This article seeks to understand the agenda of the government of Punjab behind the recent construction of the cultural heritage of sant/guru Valmiki which is attracting a sizable population of the Dalit community known as Balmikis in the state. In this context, the article explores the historical role of the Adi-Dharam Samaj, an anti-caste reformist movement by the Balmiki community. This movement has adopted various new modes and strategies to mobilize the community. It also subscribes to the philosophy of Ad Dharm to define a separate religious identity for Dalits, especially the Balmiki community separate from Hindus and Sikhs. It has also adopted a distinct path of ensuring Dalit social mobility without following the dominant modes like Sanskritization and conversion. The making of Dalit cultural heritage is a significant development in a realm that explores the extremely marginalized community within Dalits, and their attempt at identity articulation and assertion in contemporary Punjab.

Verification of Mechanical Properties of Historical Brick Masonry Walls with Masonry Quality Index Method in Iran

ABSTRACT Identification of mechanical characteristics of the materials used in heritage constructions is one of the most important steps in their seismic assessment, which may be determined through destructive, semi-destructive (or minor destructive) and non-destructive tests. Due to the fact that destructive and semi-destructive testing on heritage buildings is often impossible, Italian researchers have proposed a qualitative method called the masonry quality index to estimate the mechanical properties of heritage building materials. In this article, the MQI method has been validated in seven different historical buildings in Qajar dynasty period dating back to 1785–1925 A.D. The results were compared to those of double flat jack tests performed with permission from the Ministry of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts in Iran. The compressive strength and elastic modulus for brick masonry were in the range of 0.4–2.5 MPa and 650–4150 MPa, respectively. In addition, two equations were presented to estimate the compressive strength and elastic modulus of historical masonry walls without the need for performing minor destructive in-situ tests.

Custom, conflict and the construction of heritage: European huts on the Tasmanian Central Plateau

ABSTRACT This paper uses historical and ethnographic information to examine how local communities have turned huts on the Central Plateau, Tasmania into heritage. The Central Plateau was subject to increased environmental regulation in the late 1980s and early 1990s following the inscription of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. These regulations disrupted a range of community practices that maintained communal attachment to and ‘ownership’ of the land. Some locals responded by using the huts on the Plateau to memorialize their attachments to the mountain, creating a new status for the huts as heritage. Consequently, the government and community agreed that these buildings now required conservation management. This marks a fundamental shift in community attachment from practices (intangible heritage) to material hut preservation (tangible heritage), that has required community to accept the regulatory framework that disrupted their prior cultural practices that formed the basis of their traditional ‘communal’ ownership of the land.

Uncomfortable Memories and Non-Heritages: The Archaeology of Counter-Revolution and the Carlist Wars in the Basque Country

The development of historical archaeology in the Iberian Peninsula has opened new and stimulating avenues of research into its most recent times. One of these has been the archaeology of the Carlist Wars, a series of nineteenth-century conflicts related to the overarching process of the emergence of liberal governments in Europe and, contemporarily, of counter-revolutionary movements. This paper will describe recent excavations at Carlist sites in the southern part of the Basque Country in order to tackle two interrelated questions: the limits and possibilities of a Carlist archaeology and the close connection of the specific materialities of these events and the politics of memory surrounding them. It is argued that the Carlist War materiality has not been considered in the process of the construction of the Basque heritage because these conflicts are not introduced into the legitimating narratives of the failed-state formation project of the Basque identity.

Collaborative Workflow in an HBIM Project for the Restoration and Conservation of Cultural Heritage

ABSTRACT A restoration and conservation project for a building with heritage values requires an increasingly efficient and sustainable methodology. Based on a collaborative ‘Teamwork’ HBIM (Historic Building Information Modelling) project, this paper aims to describe the technical processes applied to a 16th-century historic building to support an open and interoperable workflow between the participating agents. The process is transparent and controllable by operators and disciplines, ensuring direct and continuous access to project data. The study focuses on implementing effective procedures for the identification and classification of heritage architecture. The first stage comprises the analysis of the geometry and materiality of the existing architecture, using data acquisition technologies such as Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) and Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry. The information modelling of the historic building begins with a medium level of knowledge, based on the metric survey and enriched by the materiality of the textures deriving from the point cloud. This enables a modelling approach that fits building components to the real geometry of the historic building, considering the deformations and irregularities that occur over time. In the next phase, the BIM project is developed through the analysis of the construction characteristics, materials, and architectural structuring in the historical evolution of the building. The difference between intervening in architectural heritage and new construction lies in the search for the transposition of construction techniques in walls with a long history, thus requiring classification and sectorisation of the various systems used. It is then required to segment the construction systems based on a semantic study of the walls that make up the envelope of the historic architecture. Programming objects in Python within the BIM platform enables the automated identification processes. The method is applied in the identification of the integrating elements of a larger construction entity, such as the stone ashlars of the masonry wall, and the classification by their construction-temporal dating. The main novelty of this research is the use of the object-oriented programming language (OOP), which automates operations based on an open-source structure and allows the operability of cataloguing, classification, and reuse characteristics.

The Database Construction of Intangible Cultural Heritage Based on Artificial Intelligence

At present, the protection of material cultural heritage is spread all over the world, but the protection of intangible cultural heritage is relatively backward. With the development of information technology, database technology provides a new retrieval method. Therefore, based on database technology, this paper constructs the database system of intangible cultural heritage, where MySQL is used as the system database, Struts 2 framework is selected in MVC to realize the separation of business logic and data display, and retrieval and query are realized through Lucene. In addition, the system takes Mongolian stringed instruments as the carrier, constructs the metadata framework, and forms the database structure. Moreover, the system is divided into six functional modules and the front and back functions of the system are managed. Finally, the system function test and performance test are carried out. The test results show that the system has good functionality, which is helpful to realize the effective protection of intangible cultural heritage.

Digital Twinning processes for the built heritage construction site: opportunities and implementation scenarios

This work investigates the introduction of concepts, processes, and methods of digital twinning to construction sites in the field of built heritage construction sites, analyzing the related opportunities and proposing an initial applicative framework. The presented architecture is conceived to face both the complexity of the artefact – in terms of its historical evolution, its configuration, the presence of values related to traditional construction methods, etc. - and of the activities and operations performed on its construction site, including the production, elaboration, and use of information in the different decision processes. This paper aims to provide a theoretical, methodological, and technical base to support the design and implementation of a digital twin for a construction site within the built heritage field.

The Place of Irish Archives

Focusing on the transatlantic market for Irish literary archives, this essay examines the symbolic weight attached to the role of such archives in the construction of Irish national heritage. Tracing the circulation of collections (such as the Gonne-Yeats Letters, the correspondence of Seamus Heaney, and Joyce’s drafts of Ulysses) between Ireland and America, this article assesses the currency of literary archives in various locations. Finally, it considers whether the institutional location of these archives is still relevant given the digitization and globalization of the knowledge economy.

Critical Review of Pakistani Current Legislation on Sustainable Protection of Cultural Heritage

This paper discusses the contribution of individuals and their effects on the protection and management of archaeological sites found in the British colonies at the beginning of the 19th Century. Despite all these contributions, the most important bequest is the formation of comprehensive legislation on cultural properties that are still applicable and considered essential to the historic, standing, or ruined, monuments located in Pakistan. It should be noted that Pakistan’s heritage laws are uniformly applicable to all kinds of architectural heritage, archaeological sites, and monuments, irrespective of their nature, state, and classification. This contrasts with the lack of updates and amendments of rules and guidelines for the preservation of heritage sites and monuments across the country from further damages. The paper focuses on the current architectural and heritage management rules and policies of Pakistan, which are based on the British colonial legacy with some (partial) changes introduced since Pakistan’s independence in 1947. Finally, the paper emphasizes the need for the development of advanced management policies and proposed heritage management rules for the preservation of heritage constructions, archaeological sites, and architectural monuments to establish the link between the present and past to remain for future generations.

The Missing Intangible Cultural Heritage in Shanghai Cultural and Creative Industries

ABSTRACT Chinese opera, a sing-song storytelling art form predominantly associated with rural and urban migrant communities, currently has over 300 regional styles. This paper investigates the intertwined development of a regional Chinese opera Shanghai All-female Yueju and its main audience, the Shanghai female textile workers and their omission in Shanghai Cultural and Creative Industries (CCI) making. Utilising theories of ‘selective memory’ and ‘strategic forgetting’, this paper argues that the official construction of Shanghai semi-colonial heritage as Shanghai’s post-industrial identity and the omission of textile Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) is not only an attempt to establish a global cosmopolitan image, but also a strategy to deal with the post-industrial trauma of compulsory female workers’ redundancy and painful community dissemination. It suggests that, until Shanghai fully acknowledges its ‘dark heritage’, the discourse of CCI lacks context and Shanghai local community continues to experience alienation and their opera form struggles for expression. The paper highlights the urgency for China, as well as globally, to safeguard and implement UNESCO’s vision in promoting ICH as a key vehicle for social inclusion and sustainable development.

Research on the Spatial Database Construction of Three-line Industrial Heritage Based on “One Map” of Territorial Space Planning <br/>—A Case Study of Mianyang Two-Bomb City

In the process of promoting the national territorial spatial planning system in all provinces, cities and counties, the geospatial database of “One Map” has realized the information sharing and collaborative work of multiple departments. Based on this, this paper intended to provide a set of standardized mapping models for industrial heritage storage, and through the establishment of the database to protect and reuse the status quo of industrial heritage research. This paper took the third-line construction industrial heritage of Mianyang “Two-Bomb City” as the research object, developed the relevant drawing standards of third-line industrial heritage database, and studied the database construction process. GIS technology is used to establish a geospatial database of the third-line industrial heritage in cooperation with the “One Map” system, in order to provide reference for the storage of the third-line industrial heritage in various places, and to protect and reuse the third-line industrial heritage from the perspectives of spatial factors, planning coordination and dynamic assessment.

Application of VR Technology Based on Actual Projects in the Protection of Local Historical Sites

Under the guidance of the existing design framework and norms for the protection as well as construction of historical and cultural relics, the feasibility of the application of VR technologies in the construction of historical and cultural relics is explored in this paper, relying on the protection and reconstruction project of the sacrificial space for the Li Clan of Shanggang Tujia Nationality in Shizhu Tujia Autonomous County, Chongqing. While perfecting predecessors' application theory of VR in cultural heritage construction, a relatively complete design system for the construction of local historical sites with the participation of VR is formed, and public participation is increased to improve the recognition of heritage protection in China. At the same time, the project plays a positive role in inheriting Tujia traditional culture and increasing cultural identity.

Сохранение объектов культурного наследия на примере фортов Кронштадта

Kronshtadt forts are the unique fortifications, which make it possible to visually trace the interdependence of the development of defensive structures, artillery and architecture, technology and military equipment on the more than two hundred years period on the example of naval fortress, never gave up to the enemy. Monuments are important from the point of view of science and technology history, military affairs, having the potential for moral and patriotic education, civiс and regional identity. Their uniqueness and importance for the world community is emphasized by the inclusion in the list of World Heritage of UNESCO as the component of the nomination «The historical center of St. Petersburg and related groups of monuments». However, despite the federal status of protection, cultural heritage sites are destroyed under the influence of natural and anthropogenic factors. It is important to preserve the fortifications of the Kronstadt fortress for future generations not in the form of ruins, but by adapting them to the modern use. As the objects of immovable cultural heritage constructions and places can be used to perform new functions, gaining a second life. Adaptation and museumification of fortifications have the potential of economical and sociocultural development of Kronshtadt and region. Directions and forms of adaptation to the modern use of cultural heritage objects are considered in the article.

Post-fire collapse assessment of the bank buildings (Belfast, UK) masonry façade via discrete element macro-analysis

On 28 August 2018, a fire broke out in the Bank Buildings, a five-story heritage construction located in the historic center of Belfast (UK), largely destroying its internal structure and leaving the outer unreinforced masonry (URM) walls free-standing. Of particular concern was the structural integrity of the East URM façade, whose cast-iron supporting system was lost in the fire. To assist the initial design of preventive public safety measures and investigate potential consequences of both local and global failures in a reduced timeframe, a simplified discrete element macro-model was developed to simulate various collapse scenarios. In this work, the adopted assumptions and modeling strategies are presented and discussed, including the selection of material properties, damping scheme, and simplified discretization. Predicted failure modes, debris distributions, magnitudes and directions of impact velocities are also compared, and main differences discussed and scrutinized. This practical and innovative application of discrete macro models enabled us to obtain reasonable results - not readily attainable using different analysis approaches - in a timely manner and provide solutions in a critical situation. Such novel employment of discrete element models - previously mostly confined to small-scale research problems - opens new structural simulation opportunities, challenges and research questions and, as such, might be of interest to both applied researchers and structural engineering professionals.

A sociosemiotic interpretation of cultural heritage in UNESCO legal instruments: a corpus-based study

Abstract The past few decades have seen a plethora of interest in heritage studies in international law, as the legitimization of cultural heritage is a significant aspect of protecting the legacy of humanity’s collective memory, which is fully reflected in a series of international instruments on culture. This paper examines the meaning-making process of UNESCO legal documents on cultural heritage from a sociosemiotic perspective. The data for the corpus-based study were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively by applying the securitization theory to heritage studies. Research findings reveal three significant shifts in cultural heritage, i.e., from property to heritage, from tangible to intangible, and from material-centered to human-centered, which embodies the harmonious coexistence of humanity and nature, a philosophical idea embedded in traditional Chinese culture. As noted, terms targeting cultural heritage in UNESCO international instruments are the sign vehicle, generally mediated and shaped by social values, cultural beliefs, and conventional wisdom, etc. as a part of the interpretant, making different categories of heritage meaningful and interpretable. Characterized by temporality and spatiality, cultural heritage is subject to multiple interpretations. The meaning-making of international instruments for consideration is a sociosemiotic operation that can be construed through contextual factors and a process of social negotiation. This paper argues that a sociosemiotic approach to heritage studies is conducive to explicating the construction and deconstruction of heritage as discursive practices while offering some implications for future research.

Investigation of the mortars and clay bricks of a luso-brazilian historic structure from XVIII century: The Nosso Senhor do Bonfim Church

Heritage constructions (HC) presents cultural, historical and architectural remarks of a community. This way, maintenance and rehabilitation of HC is an effort each time necessary for keep these structures in safety and in good state of conservation for the future generations. The materials characterization can be a key for that. To characterize the materials of a HC can allow to collect information to support the decision on what conservation strategy to follow, as well give information on the constructive techniques employed and its originality. This work has as the main aim to investigate the physical and chemical characteristic of the mortars and clay bricks samples of the Nosso Senhor do Bonfim Church, placed at Aracati downtown, in the Ceará State, Northeast of Brazil. The church was built in XVIII century and the main façade presents the so-called as “barroco sertanejo”, an architectonic style influenced by Portuguese baroque. A Portuguese heritage from the Brazil colonial period. The results showed the existence of two different mortars layers covering the church walls, where in the most superficial layer cement presence was detected. Information on the original mortar composition was collect, as well clay bricks physical and mechanical properties. This information can be useful for materials and strategy selection in future interventions on the Nosso Senhor do Bonfim Church and contributes to fill the gap of information on luso-brazilian historic construction.

Research of Chinese intangible cultural heritage knowledge graph construction and attribute value extraction with graph attention network

The development of digital technology promotes the construction of the Intangible cultural heritage (ICH) database but the data is still unorganized and not linked well, which makes the public hard to master the overall knowledge of the ICH. An ICH knowledge graph (KG) can help the public to understand the ICH and facilitate the protection of the ICH. However, a general framework of ICH KG construction is lacking now. In this study, we take the Chinese ICH (nation-level) as an example and propose a framework to build a Chinese ICH KG combining multiple data sources from Baike and the official website, which can extend the scale of the KG. Besides, the data of ICH grows daily, requiring us to design an efficient model to extract the knowledge from the data to update the KG in time. The built KG is based on the triple 〈entity, attribute, attribute value〉 and we introduce the attribute value extraction (AVE) task. However, the public Chinese ICH annotated AVE corpus is lacking. To solve that, we construct a Chinese ICH AVE corpus based on the Distant Supervision (DS) automatically rather than employing traditional manual annotation. Currently, AVE is usually seen as the sequence tagging task. In this paper, we take the ICH AVE as a node classification task and propose an AVE model BGC, combining the BiLSTM and graph attention network, which can fuse and utilize the word-level and character-level information by means of the ICH lexicon generated from the KG. We conduct extensive experiments and compare the proposed model with other state-of-the-art models. Experimental results show that the proposed model is of superiority.

Hot interpretations of difficult heritage: the Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre in China

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the construction of national heritage through the interpretation of sites and events, with a particular focus on hot interpretation at difficult heritage sites. Design/methodology/approachThis paper examines the processes of difficult heritage interpretation at the Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre over the past 30 years, and examines the resulting political implications.FindingsAligning with contemporary national social and political agendas, heritage interpretation at the Memorial Hall actively serves as an authorised educational tool. Despite the hot interpretation techniques used to stimulate the emotional impact of visitor experiences, this particular traumatic past has been utilised in nation building practices that legitimise specific histories and form a national image on an international stage.Research limitations/implicationsHeritage interpretation of difficult history will benefit from open dialogue and assessment of the past from multiple perspectives. This requires all stakeholders to work together to develop interpretation strategies that acknowledge and prioritise the needs of post-conflict societies. Without this form of open dialogue and reflection, the official claims of heritage interpretation achieving reconciliation between conflicted peoples remain superficial. Originality/valueThis study offers a novel contribution to the discussion of heritage interpretation. The results shed light on the cultural processes surrounding state interpretation of traumatic pasts for specific political uses. The study suggests ways in which heritage sectors and authorities can achieve social goals, such as public education, reconciliation and peacebuilding, through such processes of heritage interpretation.

Application of cloud technology in digital cultural heritage: an analysis of public culture cloud platforms in China

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the significant advantages of cloud technology in digital cultural heritage construction by analyzing public culture cloud platforms in China. The authors hope to provide references for other countries and regions on the applications of cloud computing techniques in digital cultural construction.Design/methodology/approachThe primary research methods involved interview and case analysis. A comprehensive understanding of cloud technology and China’s culture cloud platforms were gained through research into extensive amounts of literature. Analyzing 21 culture cloud platforms offers a general understanding of culture clouds, while the Hunan Public Culture Cloud acts as a representative sample that gives detailed insight.FindingsThis paper explores the considerable advantages of cloud computing in digital cultural construction from four aspects: integration of decentralized heterogeneous resources, coordination and cooperation, accurately matching user needs and promotion of balanced service development.Originality/valueExisting studies fall short of comprehensive investigations of culture cloud platforms and in-depth analysis of the advantages of cloud technology applications. This paper uses the construction of public culture cloud platforms in China as the research object. Further, this paper compares the construction status of different culture cloud platforms.